


Improbable Truth

by HarmMarie



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Episode: s02e21 1969, F/M, Team as Family, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-06
Updated: 2014-10-06
Packaged: 2018-02-20 04:58:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 2,614
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2415815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HarmMarie/pseuds/HarmMarie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They didn't tell General Hammond the whole truth about their trip to the past. Not even how long they were really gone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Improbable Truth

_Nothing is impossible, just improbable._

 

The team gathered in Daniel’s lab and closed the door. They didn’t want anyone to know what they were doing. There was something that they didn’t tell General Hammond, something that none of them wanted to tell him.

SG-1 had been gone a year, and they left something behind.

Jack paced the room, his patience almost at an end. “That’s it?” He practically shouted. At Sam’s grimace, his face softened. She was feeling this as much as he was.

“We have gone through every boy who was issued a birth certificate at this hospital on July 8th after 14:00. None of them are our son.” She sighed, sounding more weary than angry.

“Perhaps they did not proceed immediately to obtain the document.” Teal’c interjected.

Sam shook her head. “I met them in the hospital lobby. I saw them get onto the elevator that would take them to records. Besides, they promised and I believed them.” She spoke earnestly.

“I just wish that you knew their names or what they named him.” Jack stuck his hands into his pockets, shoulders hunched.

Sam wished she had too, but she hadn’t gotten the chance. “Maybe she told the hospital that he was born the day before.” She started turning her chair back to the computer when she caught sight of Daniel. He was staring at the computer screen in front of him. Displayed were all of the names they had gone through. She had seen that look before. It usually preceded a breakthrough in his thought process.

“Daniel?”

He didn’t immediately turn around, confirming her suspicions.

“When the two of you were trapped in Antarctica after the wormhole jumped, we starting searching any planet that you could have been directed to, eliminating the ones you couldn’t have been on.” His eyes never left the computer and Sam leaned over to see what he was looking at.

“Yeah, we were on Earth. You figured that out Daniel.” Jack didn’t get why this was important. He was about to say just that when Daniel told him why. He always was good at anticipating.

“It suddenly struck me after General Hammond called off the search that we had eliminated one planet we shouldn’t have.” He turned the computer monitor to face him more fully, pulling it out of Sam’s view. He started typing, eyes moving rapidly, words following. “We eliminated the girls, but that was fine, boys born before we even got to the hospital, also fine, but…” He trailed off, having found what he was looking for. He suddenly became aware of the tension vibrating around the room. Pushing the monitor back toward Sam he asked, “Are these the people that you spoke to?”

Sam, Jack and Teal’c all leaned in to look. On the monitor was a picture of a happy young couple, a baby boy between them.

Sam lit up. “Daniel, that’s them! How did you find that?” She turned to him, eyes alight with excitement.

He met her gaze, his expression tightly controlled. “Did you give your son to these people?” He asked with an intensity that made the hair rise on the back of Jack’s neck.

“Daniel, what’s wrong.” He demanded, “Who are these people? Did something happen to our son?...”

“Jack.” Daniel cut him off before he could get out more. “They are Claire and Melburn Jackson. They are my parents.”

The room fell into shocked silence.


	2. Improbable Truth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For the first time since he watched the Stargate vanish into thin air, Jack O’Neill was terrified.

 

It felt like crashing. Like watching the ground rise up to meet you as the plane shutters. The sinking feeling that wells up from your stomach as you watch, knowing that you are too low to eject. Listening to your friends on the radio as they watch, helpless to save you.

Jack O’Neill felt something like that when, at exactly 9:15 AM on August 10th 1969, nothing happened.

His mind came up with all sorts of explanations as to why he didn’t see it. He was looking at the wrong part of the sun, the telescope was malfunctioning, he wasn’t using it properly, his watch was wrong, that Carter was wrong about solar flares being behind this…but he knew, deep down, that none of these were true. That somehow the note was wrong, that General Hammond was wrong and they were stuck.

For the first time since he watched the Stargate vanish into thin air, Jack O’Neill was terrified.


	3. Absorbing the Truth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The security guard on duty watched the monitors with a puzzled expression. The whole team had been acting odd since they returned. She thought about contacting General Hammond, but decided against it.
> 
> SG-1 always had been a little strange.

 

Daniel felt oddly calm as he sat on the stool and watched his…parents absorb the shock of what they had all just learned. Not that he wasn’t in shock himself, (the emotional part of his brain told him he should be freaking out), just that gauging their reactions would help him absorb the information, to make it all real somehow.

He watched as Sam just sat staring, wide-eyed, at the photo on the computer screen. He wasn’t sure that she had blinked yet. He squashed the impulse to reach out and make sure she was still breathing. She looked, for all intents and purposes, dumbfounded. Probably remembering the baby she had held in her arms only a month ago was delivered by Daniel himself who was, in fact, her son, whom he delivered. Daniel moved on before he lost control of the hysterical giggle building in his chest.

Teal’c caught his eye next. The older man merely smiled and nodded his head, as though he’d known all along. Only by knowing him as well as he did, did Daniel see that he was shocked by this too. Seeing Teal’c look almost unsettled helped Daniel calm his own emotions.

He startled as he caught movement from the corner of his eye. He turned to find Jack leaning down, face inches from his own. He was searching, Daniel realized as brown eyes took in every feature, looking for his son behind the face of a friend. He fought the urge to squirm under the intense scrutiny. Jack must have reached some sort of conclusion because Daniel was suddenly pulled into a tight hug, reminiscent of the one received in the gateroom following his ‘death’ on Apophis’s ship.

Caught off guard, Daniel froze before slowly bringing up his arms to return the embrace. There, caught up in that hug, breathing in the comforting scent of Jack’s soap, Daniel’s emotions slipped past what little control remained. The calm scientific manner in which he’d been observing the room gave way to the emotion flowing beneath the surface. His eyes filled with tears as he realized that his father was hugging him and his mother was only a couple feet away.

He felt an arm brush his back and caught a glimpse of blond hair as he was sandwiched between his biological parents. His living, breathing parents. Sam and Jack were both crying, but it was fine, because he was crying too.

There was only one thing missing. This was rectified as Teal’c stepped around the workbench and into the hug where Sam and Jack had opened it to him. His eyes looked damp too.

\---

The security guard on duty watched the monitors with a puzzled expression. SG-1 had spend a lot of time in Doctor Jackson’s office, moving and talking about something on the computer before they had all frozen. Now, they were hugging and jumping around soundlessly with huge smiles, all while tears dried on their faces.

She sighed. The whole team had been acting odd since they returned. She thought about contacting General Hammond, but decided against it.

SG-1 always had been a little strange.


	4. Gregorian Slip

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Somehow when General Hammond was writing the note, he made a mistake. A devastating mistake.

 

9:15 AM 8/10/69  
6:03 PM 8/11/69

These two dates would be forever etched into the minds of SG-1.

Somehow when General Hammond was writing the note, he made a mistake. A devastating mistake. While copying the dates of the flares from the list he must have used, he wrote down the dates and times in August, but not August of 1969 like he thought.

What followed was a rollercoaster of emotions and actions. The whole team fell into a deep despair that lasted for months. Not even Sam’s reassurances that the flares had not occurred in the previous years had brought any hope. They could be going back in 1970 or ’71 or another year entirely…or not at all.

Then something happened. Acting on grief, despair, and alcohol, Jack and Sam took comfort from each other’s bodies. The unintended outcome of this was a child. This in turn led to several arguments. It wasn’t that the child was unwanted, or would be unloved, it was the changes this could bring to the timeline.

Teal’c argued that now was the only time of consequence and what could or would occur should not concern them as much as it was. He was basically saying, ‘what’s done is done.’

Daniel pointed out that General Hammond, the one from their time, knew what to write in the note because he had seen the note from himself before they had even delivered it. Therefore, all of these events had already occurred and whatever decision that Jack and Sam made, had already been made in the past. What he was basically pointing out is that ‘some things are meant to be and they will occur regardless of our actions.’

They all pondered that for some time before Sam confessed something. Her instincts were telling her to leave the child here. She said that the scientist in her was waging war with her heart, but that somehow she knew that bringing their son with them to the future would dramatically alter the past.

Jack, too, finally agreed that leaving him here was for the best. SG-1 had made a powerful enemy in Senator Kinsey and the man would do anything to bring down both Sam and Jack. A child, as physical proof of a relationship, would be the perfect ammunition for the politician. Jack could even imagine Kinsey having the boy removed from their care.

In the end it was Sam who made the solitary trek to Lenox Hill Hospital soon after giving birth. She would leave the child, her son, with the nurses there, pleading that she could not care for him. But that’s not what happened, you know.

What did happen is that she met two people in the crowded little waiting room. Hope had brought them in. They wanted a child, and so many here in this hospital didn’t. They wanted to leave their information with the nurses here, hoping that a kind nurse would pass it on to a young expectant mother who didn’t wish to be expecting. And Sam walked in carrying their miracle.

Sam walked out of the hospital with an aching body and an aching soul, but somehow…she knew she did the right thing.


	5. Whispers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She whispered to the woman’s heart, whispered into her dreams, “The child must stay.”

 

At first it was just a job.

She was chosen, out of all of The Others, to watch this strange group. They hadn’t given her permission to interfere, (they never would), but nudge on the other hand… The strange group had come from this world’s future and she was to observe if the presence of three humans and one Jaffa would affect the future of the Tau’ri.

She watched as the four realized they were trapped and the reactions to it. After so long in this plane their actions seemed strange, alien, and she found herself caring about these individuals, these lower beings. It was no longer just a job; Oma became their ‘guardian angel.’

While not exactly easy, it was simple to watch without interfering. The four handled things with the up most delicacy, preventing what could be major changes to this world. Still, she was pained to know that their grief was still strong, even after so many months in this time. She took comfort from the fact that they were together and able comfort each other, even if that comfort took a different form between two of their number. She would not have thought much of this comfort if not for what had occurred.

A child was conceived.

This was not unusual. Children were conceived on this world all the time, it was the nature of that child that was concerning. She recognized its essence, its ‘soul’ for lack of a better term. The unborn child’s soul burned brightly, burning with the exact same intensity as the man the two traveled with. Two souls never matched so well, and she concluded that the two souls were, in reality, the same soul.

It took her some time to figure out what had happened, or what was going to happen. Based on her observations and her knowledge, she knew that the four would eventually leave…but the child must stay.

This knowledge broke her heart, but the timeline must remain unchanged or severe consequences could occur. So she whispered.

She whispered to the woman’s heart, whispered into her dreams, “The child must stay.”

As the time of their departure grew closer, the four became more eager, less grief-stricken, but the woman knew. Knew what Oma had whispered was true. But she did not speak.

For months, while the child grew inside her, the woman said nothing. So Oma whispered again, this time to the father. She whispered into his heart, prayed on his greatest fears. He did not speak.

It wasn’t until just before the child was born, that it was spoken.

But Oma could not leave it there. She sought out the best people for the child, nudged them to be in the right place at the right time. Whispered to the woman that these people would care for her son. Helped her, however subtly, handover her son to strangers, whispering soothing words to ease the pain of separation, for she knew they would not be separated for long.

Then she watched. It was all she could do.

She split her time between the four and the child, but the four quickly returned to their own time. Then she guarded the child alone.

Fate took his new parents after only a short time, and her heart broke as she could do nothing to help them. But she stayed and she watched after him as much as possible. It never seemed like enough.

When he was the one to figure out the long buried Stargate, she worried.

When his father, who knew nothing of his living son, fingered his gun, she whispered.

When the child was killed protecting his father, she wept.

And when the child stood with his parents for the first time in a room on a desert world, she smiled.


	6. Gravitation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It felt like crashing. Like the ground was rushing towards her and the controls were dead.

 

It felt like crashing. Like the ground was rushing towards her and the controls were dead. She gripped the stick in her hand but there was nothing she could do.

She was pregnant. That night with the alcohol and Jack and the alcohol (God she’d been drunk) was never meant to happen. They hadn’t planned it, so no condoms, and her SGC birth control had long since worn off and now…

She felt sick. The four of them were barely keeping their heads above water and now they would be adding another mouth, another potentially timeline altering person to this already messed up situation.

Deep breaths, she reminded herself. Maybe the test was wrong. Maybe the stress was disrupting her period, but she knew it wasn’t. She was weeks late, almost months. She knew why.

A knock sounded on the bathroom door. Daniel, asking if she was alright.

_No,_ she thought, _I’m not alright. I’m completely terrified. What do I do?_

Sam Carter remained frozen on the edge of the tub, while gravity pulled her faster and faster towards the ground.


End file.
